Stefan Nimke

Stefan Nimke
	At the World Track Championships in Melbourne, ; Nimke won his sixth World Championship gold
To person
Nickname	Bodo
Date of birth	March 1, 1978
nation	Germany
discipline	train
Driver type	Sprinter, 1000 m time trial
Societies)
	PSV Schwerin
Team (s)
	Track Cycling Team ; Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania
Most important successes
	World championships World champion 1000 m time trial 2003, 2009, 2011, 2012; World champion team sprint 2010, 2011 Olympic games Olympic champion team sprint 2004 Olympic silver 2000 in the 1000 m time trial Olympic bronze in the 1000 m time trial in 2004 and in the team sprint in 2008 Paralympic Games 2016 - 1000 m time trial (as a pilot of Kai Kruse )
	Last updated: September 11, 2016

Stefan Nimke (born March 1, 1978 in Hagenow ) is a German track cyclist who specializes in short-term disciplines. He is Olympic champion and six-time world champion. After he won the bronze medal in the 1000-meter time trial with Kai Kruse at the 2016 Summer Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro , he is the only German to have won medals at both the Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Athletic career

Nimke started cycling in Schwerin in 1987 . In 1994 he won his first national junior championship. In 1996 the first German championship title followed with the elite. From 2000 to 2008 he drove for the “XXL Natural Gas Team” and since then for the “Trackcycling Team Mecklenburg-Vorpommern”.

At the Olympic Games in Sydney in 2000 he won the silver medal in the 1000 meter time trial on the track . Nimke became world champion for the first time in 2003 over the same distance. In 2004, at the Olympic Games in Athens , he and Jens Fiedler and René Wolff won gold in the Olympic sprint and bronze over 1000 meters in the time trial. In 2006 he won his first world championship medal in the sprint in bronze in Bordeaux .

On March 27, 2009 Nimke won the gold medal in the 1000-meter time trial at the track cycling world championships in Pruszków, Poland, with a time of 1: 00.666 min . The time was the fastest ever at world championships over 1000 meters and at the same time meant an improvement on his own German record, which he set in 2004. It was only his second competitive 1000 meter race after focusing on the sprint.

In spring 2011, Nimke won the silver medal in the team sprint together with Maximilian Levy and René Enders at the 2011 UCI Track World Championships in Apeldoorn . After the French team the gold medal for violation of the reporting requirements-the WADA by Gregory Bauge was stripped in January 2012 because it was officially classified as a doping offense, the gold medal went to the German trio. At the UCI Track World Championships 2012 Melbourne Nimke won his sixth World Championship gold and his fourth in the time trial; he set an unofficial lowland record with a time of 1.00.082 minutes, as the French Arnaud Tournant had set the existing world record in 2001 at the altitude of La Paz at 3600 meters.

At the 2012 Olympic Games in London , Nimke was nominated for the team sprint. Shortly before the start of the competition, however, he had to cancel his start due to an injury, and Robert Förstemann took his place . It would have been his fourth Olympic Games and should be the highlight and conclusion of his career.

After Stefan Nimke announced his retirement from competitive sports after the games, he announced his retirement in November 2012. He plans to stay active until at least the 2013 German rail championships. In July 2014 he took part in the Race Across America as a member of the Best of Northern Germany team with track cyclist Daniel Rackwitz and triathletes Michael and Denis Kruse . The team finished the 4,800-kilometer race in 5 days and 19 hours, finishing fourth in its category.

Pilot on the tandem

Stefan Nimke (r.) And Kai Kruse

Since 2013, Nimke has been preparing, together with the visually impaired driver Kai Kruse, as a pilot on the tandem for the 1000-meter time trial at the 2016 Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro . This pairing was created as part of the Tandem 2016 initiative of the German Disabled Sports Association . At the UCI Paracycling World Track Championships in 2014 , they both finished fifth in the 1000-meter time trial . The following year the duo won the bronze medal at the World Championships in Apeldoorn .

In 2016 Nimke started as a pilot for Kai Kruse at the Paralympics in Rio. In the pursuit they finished 13th, in the time trial over 1000 meters they won the bronze medal. This makes Nimke the first German athlete to win medals in both the Olympic and Paralympic Games. After the UCI Paracycling World Championships in 2019 , Nimke and Kruse parted ways.

In autumn 2018, Stefan Nimke started training with his new partner Tim Kleinwächter .

Honors

Stefan Nimke was honored with the induction into the Hall of Fame of the European cycling association Union Européenne de Cyclisme .

On November 1, 2016, he received the Silver Laurel Leaf for his sporting successes .

Professional and family

Stefan Nimke has been the most successful German track cyclist since the late 1990s; he rides for the " Track Cycling Team Mecklenburg-Vorpommern ". He is married and has two children. He was a sports soldier in the Bundeswehr in the sports promotion group in Frankfurt (Oder) . From September 2008 he completed his training as a middle-class police officer at the University of Applied Sciences for Public Administration, Police and Justice in Güstrow.

In 2017 Nimke was one of the members of the Federal Assembly which elected the future Federal President . In October 2019 he was elected to the city council of Schwerin and has been a member of the CDU / FDP parliamentary group ever since .